Pumpkin carving has become a popular pastime especially during the Halloween season. In fact, pumpkin carving has become so popular that there is now a demand for a variety of pumpkin carving implements including pumpkin face patterns, carving tools and drilling tools as well as a variety of pumpkin carving kits. These pumpkin carving implements and kits can be used by children or adults with a carving skill level ranging from a hobbyist to a professional.
Often, during Halloween season, scary faces are carved into pumpkin shells and, during night hours, a lit candle is placed into the pumpkin shell so that the scary face is brightly illuminated in the dark of night for any passers-by who dare to view it. Either short, slender candles or votive candles are employed for this purpose. Usually, votive candles are set, unsecured, into the pumpkin. Homemade holders of aluminum foil and pins, or candles set onto plates with wax are sometimes used to hold candles. None of these methods hold the candles securely, allowing them to tip over and be extinguished or even permitting them to fall out of the pumpkin. Also none of these methods contains the wax of votive candles, therefore the burning time of votive candles is reduced. With the pumpkin carving industry aware of these problems associated with candles in pumpkins a wire device has been introduced. A first segment of the wire device is wrapped around the candle stock several times and the remaining segment at the bottom of the candle stock is coiled to form, in essence, a stand to be placed inside the pumpkin shell. While holding the candle securely in the pumpkin, the wire holder does nothing to contain the wax of the votive candle, allowing it to melt over the wire holder and spread across the bottom of the pumpkin. This significantly decreases the burning time of the votive candle.
Additionally, as candles burn in pumpkins it is necessary to provide a chimney or flue so that smoke and heat from the candle can escape. This flue or chimney is usually carved with a knife and consequently appears as an unsightly non-uniform, polygonal hole. This chimney is typically located at the top of the pumpkin proximately to the stem. Due to the thickness of the pumpkin shell near the stem, the difficulty of cutting such a chimney with a knife is increased as is the risk of injury to the carver.
There is a need in the industry to provide a hand-held drilling tool which can bore a cylindrical hole in a selected material such as a pulp or a skin of a pumpkin or some other fruit or vegetable. There is also a need in the industry to provide a single hand-held drilling tool which can bore cylindrical holes of varying diameters. Moreover a need exists for a lightweight, inexpensive drilling tool which may be used to form a hole in a carved pumpkin so that the pumpkin will securely hold a candle and will contain any melting wax to enhance candle life. Such tool should be capable of inclusion in a kit or sold alone. The present invention satisfies these needs and provides these benefits.